


Three Hundred and Eleven Days

by DailyDoseOfDisappointment



Category: South Park
Genre: M/M, Short One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-09
Updated: 2016-07-09
Packaged: 2018-07-22 12:17:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7438806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DailyDoseOfDisappointment/pseuds/DailyDoseOfDisappointment
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three hundred and eleven days of overcast skies left Stan Marsh wondering why he came to Buffalo, New York, anyway.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Three Hundred and Eleven Days

**Author's Note:**

> I'm going through a serious case of writer's block. So I've been writing crap, and this was one of the things I hated the least. So whatever.

Life had become stale-- boring. God, it had become dreadfully boring. Stan wasn’t really sure why he’d chosen Buffalo of all places to attend school, but he was genuinely beginning to regret it. It wasn’t like he’d ever envisioned himself a student, to begin with. It wasn’t like he saw himself with a future in mathematics. Still, for some reason, he buckled down and studied every night for tests that he knew he would fail, and trudged his way from class to class under overcast skies.

Everything about this place seemed so gray compared to where he was from. He was used to snow capped mountains and blue skies for miles-- amazing views of valleys and distant cities and towns. This place was flat, and he felt low to the ground, and crowded, and unbearably bored. He didn’t like how many people lived there; he didn’t like how many colorless, gray buildings were shoved together, stacked on top of one another.

Buffalo was a big city; Buffalo was also the cloudiest city in the United States. Buffalo averaged at three hundred and eleven days of cloudy skies, two hundred and eight of which days were heavily clouded.

Stan had no idea why he’d chosen Buffalo.

And it was nothing against Buffalo, obviously. It was nothing against the state of New York. There were lots of great things in New York. He just wasn’t happy there. He was bored and lonely, and chasing a college career that he had no interest in.

It was a foggy day in late October that he decided to take a stroll through Riverside Park, a bit disappointed by this  year’s foliage. He’d been around long enough to have seen last year’s leaves change in color, and it had been mightily impressive. The oranges and reds and yellows had brightened up the entirety of the park, bringing it to life all while making it seem unbelievably fantastical. It had been like living inside an oil painting for a good two weeks before the leaves all crumbled, browned and died, falling from the branches of dormant trees.

This year, there were no colors-- none that were vibrant or impressive as the year prior. Everything seemed to be doused in a shade of brownish gray, offering absolutely no visual stimulation. It was, indeed, quite the disappointment.

A breath of air flushed over his lips, an icy cloud of air escaping him and dissipating on the wind as he seated himself on a bench. He watched as people wandered past him, chatting amiably with friends, taking notes, texting and talking on cell phones. He watched them all come and go, meander and hurry along. That was when somebody took a seat beside him, and his stomach churned nervously.

The first sign that autumn had arrived late was not the fall of a solitary leaf, or the chill in the air. It was shocking red hair, peachy skin, and warm green eyes that shook him awake, and made him reevaluate the scene. Stan was not much one for staring at strangers, but he couldn’t stop himself from glancing at his new bench mate. And once he did, he could not pry his eyes away. The red of his hair was everything that this dismal scene had been lacking, the cure for his dystopian nightmare and the antidote to his depressive poison. Suddenly, he was far more appreciative of the dullness of his surroundings. Without the monochromatic state of the world, he may not have been caught up in the beauty beside him. He’d never seen hair that color before. He’d never asked a stranger on a date before.

Now, in the dead of winter, he studied the freckles that dotted peachy cheeks. He memorized the way that every piece of hair atop his head fell perfectly into place, wild and tame all at once. He immortalized the scent of toothpaste and cologne in his mind, determined never to forget. Something as mundane as curling up together to watch a movie had become a whole new experience for him. He’d never read into it so heavily, when another human being was involved, but dammit, the guy was special.

He loved the way that his lip would quiver when he was angry, and he loved the way his cheeks would flush whenever he got passionate or worked up over something. He revelled in the way his eyes squinted at the corners when he was really, really smiling, and the way his nose would scrunch up whenever he would kiss the bridge or tip of it. He loved how annoyed his redhead would get whenever he’d try to distract him from their little tiffs with kisses and sweets-- he loved how easy it was to sway his moods with chocolate and candy.

Kyle was an unrelenting force for good in his life, Stan decided, and it made him happy to have him at his side. He proudly walked through the park, holding his hand, and marveled in how beautiful his hair looked against the snowy foreground. He kissed him there, in public, whether or not there was somebody there to witness the moment. He didn’t care if it was shared, or if it was just theirs. It didn’t matter, because he had fire and desire, even in the coldest month of the year.

He stopped questioning why he’d come to Buffalo, after all that.


End file.
